#2400s

today was a really good day.

joel got his cast off and is now in a boot that he can take off for things. yay!

graduation was fuckin hot. but it was wonderful! it was at the baseball stadium in manchester, and the graduates (we) were sitting on chairs on the field. in the sun. in black polyester gowns and hats. thankfully there was a breeze, and it didn't go the full two hours i had anticipated it being.

and honestly, it was really cool. when i graduated from UNHM, it was a standard-faire 4-year-university graduation. this one recognized the hard work of each student and the diversity in the graduating class, took pride in it. and that was really beautiful.

but back to the beginning.

directions were unclear tbh. once i found where i was supposed to go, i made my way down a long/ass hill to the check-in point for students. after checking in and stopping by the ptk table to grab my cords, i went to the table next to it, and i was given this envelope. inside was a medal that was placed around my neck by the person handling the packets. a bright smile on my face at my second-ever medal, i went and found my seat on the other side of the field. after a bit of curiosity, i opened the packet. i found a letter inside. the letter was from the school. (obviously.) but what it said i was humbled by.

the letter told me that i had been given the recipient of the academic excellence award for the math and physics department.

i could tell by the nomination blurb that i had been nominated by dr. noah. i read the letter four times, and i looked at my medallion, and i cried. i called my aunt who had called me a minute before and i told her and my mother about it. my mom cried too.

the commencement speaker spoke about her experience as an ICU nurse and as a air force national guard medic helping distribute vaccines. but what i really got from her speaking about her experiences in nursing dealing with covid-19 was that humanity is resilient. people are hardy. we as communities are built stronger than the challenges we face. and sure, shit gets hard. we've dealt with a global pandemic, a wildly and debilitatingly traumatizing event, and come out on the other end. maybe a little worse for wear, maybe a lot worse for wear. but we've come out the other end. we as individuals and as communities will persevere, regardless of what we face. more than ever, i felt that. and that had me in tears.

we had all been given pieces of paper with our names on them and we had been lined up in alphabetical order by seat (i was by where the shortstop would be), and as we went up to receive our "diplomas," we were to give the person who called the names the paper so they knew who we were as they announced us going by. president bicknell handed out the folders and congratulated us each as we went by. as i walked down the first base line, i saw both dr lamontagne and dr eckhardt sitting in the front row of the professors! they waved and cheered as i walked by, and i waved and smiled back. i made a heart with my hands at them, and they made hearts back!! i love them so much. i'm so glad they were there.

we were stopped for photos at first base, and were sent walking back around to our seats.

tassels changed, lots of applause, leaving the field row by row, albeit a little slowly. that was because there were things we needed to pick up on our way out: namely alumni sweatshirts and our diplomas! i walked out with lots of sweat, new cords, pins, a medal, a letter and certificate of achievement, and my diploma. how fucking cool is that. it was so nice to feel like my hard work and stress and consternation was validated, that it was all worth it in the end. because it really was. it still is. and i'm so excited about that.

we went to olive garden after, and my parents gave me a short note and a pandora charm for my bracelet, one with a graduation cap with a floppy tassel on a stack of books. it's perfect.

joel and i headed home after that, him plopping on the couch and me resting a little bit before heading out to paint like any other tuesday evening. i finished up the flamingo i started a few weeks ago for lisa for mother's day! finally. i'm excited to see how it'll turn out. i got to show hannah and casey my medal too! it's so cool. i took a picture of it and sent it to a bunch of people on snapchat, and andrew sent back a message saying "good job Zuko!!" i said, "why am i zuko" and then, "is it because i'm bad at being good or is it because i'm really awkward" and he just sent back, "HONOR" and i lost my shit. just absolutely lost it. i totally didn't even realize that. it does say "honor" on it, so it makes sense but i totally missed it.

after dinner hannah brought out her gift for me. i must include three things: (1) at this point i was very tired, (2) i cry when i get tired, and also (3) i cry over cute things.

so it's no surprise to anybody that i broke down sobbing when i opened this box with a fuzzy stuffed frog with a graduation cap and a flower. like, i couldn't stop the tears. wiping them away just made my face wet. and then i read the card that he was holding, and i cried harder. i managed to cry a little less hard, and then i opened the rest of the box to find graduation socks (more tears) and an envelope that had stickers of adorable animals who were graduating or studying (even more tears). i just cried for a solid like, seven minutes. and then i cried some more when i got back in the car! because what would it be without tears.

his name is harold.

(i even did some homework before obsessing over scheduling for unh for the fall. amazing.)

(and the fact that joel was there with me through the whole thing, even though he doesn't really see it as a big deal, it meant a lot to me that he was there for me. and i'm grateful he came along.)

y'all.

i am LOVING this new medication.

have a list of the things i did today:

ate breakfast

talked to my mom for a while

took out the trash from my room (there was a lot)

took out still-good things to be donated (there was a lot of this too)

worked with a student for an hour and a half

attended a student senate meeting where i was helpful, asked a bunch of questions, and remember what we talked about

took a short break to talk to my parents

went back and worked with another student for three hours

AND

did fourteen assignments

yep. fourteen.

yes, i am exhausted. but i beat my goal for today and i'm 2 assignments shy of my overall goal for the end of friday. at this rate, i'll be done on sunday.

i love being able to focus and not get angry at problems when i have to do them over or they don't work. i love it. i'm so happy about it.

i must go. i just sleep.

did i get up on time today? no.

did joel go into work today? also no.

did i get up and take my meds anyway? absolutely not.

did i sleep until 1pm? yep.

did i feel human today? nope.

did i at least do homework today? another no.

did i do anything today? yes!

what did i do today? i got lunch with joel! i watched eureka! i submitted my work hours!

is that all?

today was a day. i like that it's been rainy and relatively cool out, but it's really not helping the depression and chronic brain fog i'm trying to get through on a daily basis. it sucks bigtime.

i also need to remember to take my meds, because apparently the brain fog is a side-effect for not taking them? i doubt it would be this severe if it were because of the medication, because i really only took it for a few days before i completely forgot to for more than a week.

also i plan on getting coffee tomorrow. i went to get some today but it was closed early :c

tomorrow is thursday and i have only school things to do. i have a lot of school things to do. i simply wish for death.

joel was struggling today. between his headphones not working and my sleeping later than he did, and his general frustration with the cast and the crutches and transportation of things around the house, i can see why he was struggling. i do what i can for him. i try. there's only so much i can do, though. so we do what we can and struggle through the rest of it.

i worked with a student today for a couple hours. she'd sent me the exam she needed to take so i could look at it so we could work on problems together, like examples of the same kinds so she'd be familiar with it, and the exam her teacher posted yesterday was all star wars references. all of it. except for one, which was about the first and third quartiles of a set of data. that was the only one that wasn't star wars-related. it was honestly hilarious. i love it.

anyway, i'm home to help my mom find some important paperwork tomorrow, so hopefully i can find it no problem.

yeah.

what even was today

i was woken up by a donut being handed to me. hell yeah. i got up and actually sat down at my computer for a hot minute to take my meds and start on my thermo homework, which i actually did a little bit of. which was nice. less stressful than matlab. it's just math.

got up, showered, went to joel's for today's d&d game, during which we decided as a party to buy ourselves a house. that's what we did. we went real estate shopping. i fucking love d&d.

joel got home while we were playing, and eventually re-emerged from the other room after we were all done and as we were just chatting.

lisa made steak for dinner and casey left, and daniel and i were just sitting for a while and joel came over and he and john joined in the conversation and it was nice.

during said conversation, joel and i told them that we'll be adopting kids at some point, because we both want to. joel poked me and said i just needed to not be broke all the time. which, yknow, fair. but that made me really happy.

lmao i woke up at 6pm. took a shower, chilled out a bit, went to see dao and joth and it TURNS OUT that they also miss hannah, so i sent her a snapchat and said they missed her, and to reach out when she can. so that's good. i'll have my squad back together ;-;

ended up chatting with dao and joth until like, 11:30 or something, and by the time i got back to londonderry, everything was closed so i waltzed my gremlin ass into a gas station convenience store to grab some things for joel to eat. got back, been chillin with joel since then. he gives me hugs and then says "why do you need affection." like, sure jan.

long day.

i woke up this morning and stayed in bed a little bit. i went downstairs and i talked to dr noah and i worked on some matlab and i played animal crossing for a little bit. i eventually took a shower.

this morning, as i was in bed, i got a text from hannah saying she'd gotten hit in the face with a basketball. which, yknow, sucks. been there, but with a tetherball. i was talking to joel at that point, so i mentioned that she got hit. he said instantly she might have a concussion and that she should get it checked out.

cue when i'm chillin, cooling down, sitting after showering, and hannah says she needs a ride to urgent care. so i get up, get dressed, and go get her. we go to the urgent care in manchester. two hours there, doctor asks two questions and says he'll call ahead for us to go to the emergency room - he wanted her to get a cat scan. so around 7 we headed to the ER. she got her wrist band, i got my visitor sticker. we wait.

now, i have never been around a person who had a concussion before. all i knew about concussions is that you shouldn't let someone with a concussion sleep, at least without the acknowledgement of the doctor. but hannah has an early self-imposed bedtime because she works at a school with kiddos, and they start early. so by 9:30, hannah was entirely falling asleep. and i had to make sure she wasn't. so i pestered her and poked her and by the time 11pm rolled around, we were both really hungry as neither of us had eaten much of anything at all. so we order food with doordash, and it's delivered a little after midnight. we munch, hannah talks to friend, we head back inside after we've both finished food and she's overcome her sensory overload-induced panic attack.

we wait another hour or two, and we're finally brought back. in the meantime, i read up a little bit and discovered that ordinarily people with concussions should be woken regularly to make sure they can wake up normally, so i'd let her sleep when i had the chance. i talked about some quantum mechanics and a lot of wedding planning things, because who else was i gonna talk to about it at 3:15 in the morning? we finally get to see the nurses and doctors in here, who determine that she does in fact have a concussion, but it's mild. she gets an IV of meds to help her symptoms and help her feel better. she's now sleeping soundly, likely chilly, but that's because hospitals are fuckin' cold.

i'm still up. i intend to watch over her until the doctor gives us the OK to go home. the IV drip is almost empty, so i hope that's soon, but i doubt it. but even if it's two more hours, it's fine. however long it takes to help her feel better.

and don't even get me started on her mother.

she isn't fucking here, first of all. she hasn't been any fucking help, second. third, she hasn't communicated with her husband at all about hannah's situation. fourth, it's like neither of them care at all about her or what's going on. i am this fucking close to burning her house down with her parents inside. i'm adopting her and her siblings and that's that. sean and amy can fuck all the way off. if they don't care about one of their children, they don't deserve to take care of any of them. fucking useless.

i'm mad. i'm indignant. i'm angry. i'm honestly livid. i have never met either of them but sean was already on my shitlist, and amy was on thin fucking ice. nope. they're both fuckin useless.

i'm incredibly angry at how they treat my best friend. their daughter. how can you be so fucking heartless to not put your children's well-being before your fucking job, huh? or your own well-being? fucking assholes. they don't deserve hannah. bastards.